Monument 14 by Emmy Laybourne

In Emmy Laybourne’s action-packed debut novel, six high school kids (some popular, some not), two eighth graders (one a tech genius), and six little kids trapped together in a chain superstore build a refuge for themselves inside. While outside, a series of escalating disasters, beginning with a monster hailstorm and ending with a chemical weapons spill, seems to be tearing the world—as they know it—apart.

Set in a slightly futuristic America, several kids are hit with a horrible storm on their way to school forcing them to take shelter in a local store. Increasing deadly events occur cutting them off from the rest of the world and they do what they have to survive till help can find them.

Character Highlights:

Dean – Definitely not who I thought he would be, of course come to think of it none of the characters matched up with my first assessment.

Niko – Interestingly enough I thought I would like him a whole lot more than I did by the end. I think his matter of fact attitude while resourceful was a bit off-putting.

Jake- Probably the character I flip-flopped the most on. I loved him one chapter and hated him the next. I’m curious to see what happens to him after the decisions he made.

Overall Thoughts:

This book was NOTHING like I thought it would be and I mean that that in great way. Reading the blurb and seeing that there are so many smaller kids in the story I thought it would be harder to relate to the characters and connect but I loved all of these kids. I know sometimes when reading some of the characters start to blend together but I actually stopped halfway through and counted them out to myself and I remembered all of them for specific reasons. I also loved that no one fit the role I put them in when we were first introduced to their characters and that there were several scenes that surprised me. For the premise of the book I found the book to be a bit short but thankfully I have book two waiting for me to start ASAP!

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5 thoughts on “Monument 14 by Emmy Laybourne”

Oh I’m so glad you enjoyed this one!! I think I was the same way… I had a lot of expectations and it was actually really different. I also enjoyed that it was a wide age range of kids so some had to take on more of a leadership role, and also that it was pretty much straight up post-apocalyptic/natural disaster instead of that in combination with dystopian. I feel like the two are usually mashed together!

Yeah…. when this one came out I think I was totally over the post apocalyptic dystopian the world is ending genre… maybe I should look at this one again, especially since its sequel is coming out! Or is out… I don’t know. 🙂